Instruction set



Feb. 17 1925. 1,526,547

F. E. HUGHEY INSTRUCTION SET Filed Oct. 10, 1921 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 Eigl 1/ Z9 15/ 55 55 2 flax-$41: a5 1515 66 Feb. 17. 1925- F. HUGHEY INSTRUCTION SET Filed Oct. l0 1921 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Patented Feb. 17, 1925.

UNITED STATES FANNIE E. HUGHEY, OF CHICAGO, ILLINOIS.

Application 'flled October 10, 1921. Serial No. 506,866.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, FANNIE E. HUGHEY, a citizen of the United States, residing at Chicago, in the [county of Cook and State of Illinois, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Instruction Sets, of

- which the following is a specification.

Thisinvention relates to apparatus for teaching music and more particularly to apparatus for teaching music to young children y the aid of colors and colored objects.. It is a purpose of the invention to provide means for teaching music by using distinctive colors to represent the different tones in a musical scale, so that a child will associate the color with the particular note that it represents. I g

It is a further object of the invention to provide 'meanswhereby the child will be aided in learning what color is used to represent a certain note, by using pictures of objects with which the child is' familiar in colors that are being used, said pictures being preferably of birds, whereby the analogy of a birds note and the tone to be learned is maintained and the interest of the child is stimulated in a similar way to that now used in other kindergarten work.

It is a further purpose of the invention to provide apparatus for teaching musiccomprising colored markers'to be used in, combination withthe keyboard of a piano or a chart representing such a keyboard. and 0'01- ored pictures, preferably of birds, which are of the same colors as said markers, said ictures being used for the purpose of teach- 1n the child the musical tone which the 00 or of each picture signifies and said markers being used for the purpose of identifying the keys of the piano corresponding to said colors and said tones;

It is still another purpose of the invention to provide a chart comprising a representation of a keyboard of a piano and a musical stafi and in combinationitherewith a plurality of colored markers to be placed in said chart, said markers being made in various colors corresponding to the notes that they represent,'s'a1d markers being both in the form of :disk-like stickers or labels and thumb-tacks withcolored heads.

It is still another purpose of the invention to provide means for teaching children the duration of tones b tproviding a, plurality of colored strips 0 e variousoolors recompanying drawings ferred to above, of various lengths, representing Whole notes or fractions thereof, said strips being used in combination with a chart indicating-the division of the music into measures and with pictures of the birds in the corresponding colors representing the varioustones- I It is a articular purpose of the invention to provi e thumbtacks of the mentioned character with members having openings there'through for receiving the shank of the tack, and carrying hooks upon which may be hung'cards bearing pictures in the colors corresponding to the colors of the heads of the tacks and-cards havingcolored disks thereon of corresponding colors for familiarizing the pupils with the various ways of representing the tones b said colors.

Other ob ects;and advantages of the invention will appear as the description of the acroceeds. However, I desire to have it d stinctly understood that I do not intend to limit myself to the exact details shown in the drawings and described in the specification, but that I intend to include as part of my invention all such obvious changes and modifications of parts as would oc'cur to a person skilled in this art andas would fall within the scope of the claims.

In the drawings: v

Fig. 1 is a plan view of a chart embodying the features of the present invention;

Fig. 2 is a plan view of a card having the picture of a bird and a pitch and duration strip of the same color used in conjunction therewith; i r

Fi 3 isa view of a staff showing convention y thereon the note represented in Fig. 2 bythe picture of the bird and the colored strip;

F1g.) 4 is a fra entary view showing a thum tack seen in a. support and having a hookcarrying member mounted thereon, said hook carrying member having a. card mounted thereon i Fig. 5 is a plan viewof one form of card that may be attached to the hook;

Fig. 6 is a similar view of another form of card that may be similarly attached;

Fig. 7 is atperspective view of a thumbtack without hook attachment;

Fig. 8 is a perspective view of a gummed disk used in conjunction with a piano keyboard as shown in the chart in Fig. 1.

Fig. 9 is a perspective. view of the hook employed for hanging a cardon one of the thumb-tacks.

Referring in detail to the drawings the comprising the white keys 13 and the black I to mark the lines'on the staff orth'e spaces.

keys 14'. In conjunction therewith is used a plurality of colored disks 15 shown in *perspective in Fig. 8; The disks 15 are provided, with suitable adhesive for securing the same to the keys of a: piano orarep-resentation of a piano keyboard as shown in Fig. 1.

the scale having a particular color assigned thereto. 7 v The thumb-tack 16 shown in perspective in Fig. 7 are falso used i'n-conjunction with the chart.- said th mb tacks being used between said lines to correspond with the marking of the keys on the keyboard on said chart or on a piano. That is to say,

the thumb-tacks are provided with' coloredheads corresponding to the colors of the disks used to markthe -keys,'the disk numbered 1 in Fig.j1'beingthe same color asthe head {of the thumb-tack numberedl insaid Figure, and the disk 4 said figure being the same color and soon. In conjunction with the-chart, the-thumbtacks with the colored heads and the'colored disks, are used cards 17 hearing pictures of birds in colors corresponding to the colors of the disks and thumb-tacks; One of said cards is shown in Fig. 2 and is shown as having a bird thereon'of the colorcorresponding to that of the first note of the scale as represented by the disks and thumb-tacks. The card may be made as shown at 17 in F ig. 5, in which figurethecard is shown as being provided with an eyelet 18 so that the same may be hung upif desired. In order to. associate the color on the thumb-tack head with the colored picture of the bird suitablemeans is provided for bringing 'the same in close proximity before the eyes of the child, said means comprising a hook'19 which is adapted to be hung from the shank 20 of the thumb-tack 16. The hook ispreferably provided with an enlargement at 21 having an opening for receiving the shank of the thumb-tack and with a depending portion 22 terminating-in a hook 233. As will be clear from Fig. 4 the hook member is mounted, on the shank of the thumb-tack between the head 24thereof and a suitable support 25 for receiving the thumb-tack.

.card a being capable of mg in color to. the colors used;

The disks which constitute lrIey markers are of different colors, each note of and thumb-tack numbered 3 in In order to bring the colors of the key markers more clearly before the minds of the students a card 26 havingan eyelet 27 and provided with a representation of a.

colored disk 28 corresponding in'color to one of the key markers is provided, said being hung on the tack 16 in aslmilar manner to the-card 17.

The above "mentioned apparatus merely teaches the pitch of the various notes of the scale without teaching'their relative dura- -tion, and in order, to teach this other appa ratus is used in con unctlon with the above mentioned devices, said apparatuscomprising a: plurality of colored strips'corres pondthe various notes indicated in v the disks. birds and thumb-tacks.

The strips are of to represent various lengths to represent the various length notes such as whole notes, halfnot'es and quarters The strips areshown in Fig. 1 and. a strip 29 'is shown representing the whole note shown at 30 inf Fig. -1. sai d strip being of" the note. Similarly the strips 31 which are half as lon'g'as the strips"29" represent the half notes 32 and the strips 33 represent; the quarter notes'34 and are one fourth as long as the strips conjunction with" a chart marked off in measures by means of the divisional markinsssa x In Fig. 2 is shown acard ture of a bird thereon .of the 'color representing the note shown at 36 in Fig. 3 and'astrip 29 of the same'color'as thejpictureof the proper color to represent said go 17 having pic;

29. f These'strips' are used-in.

bird. said cardbeing movable longitudinally of the strip to graphically illustrate the length of the note representd at 36. The" apparatus isused in the; following manner: The student. a young child, is first shown the picture 'of the bird representing the first note of the scale. this note being I in the key of C major middle C. The color of this bird is preferably red, although other colors may be used without departing from the spirit of the ferred way, to use the picture is to show the child the picture and tell it that the red bird sings do sounding the note vocally at-this time. After the child has learned to associate the picture of the red bird with the tone"do then the colored [disk v15 maybe placed on the piano keyboard or. therepre- I sentation thereof at 1 and the analogy of the bird carried out by telling the child that .the

invention. "The preparticular key is the nest for the red bird.

In a similar mannerthefifth note may be represented by the color blue'and learned in a similarmanner. and then the third note,

the second note, the fourth note and finally the sixth, seventh and eighth, each colors. r the notes are learned in the manner position thereof on the staff as represented by distinctive Afte I outlined the being a well as on the piano keyboard is learned by placing the thumb-tacks with the heads of the proper colors in the positions that said .notes would occupy on the staff. The analogy between the colors and birds of the same colors may be carried out by referring to the lines and spaces on the staff as rails on a fence upon which the birds may perch. As previously stated the colors on the heads of the tacks. on the disks and of the birds may be so placed as to be readily associated with each other by using the colored headed thumb-tacks with the hooks as shown in Fig. 6.

Then the lengths of the various notes are learned by means of the colored strips. The colored strips can be readily compared in length by superposition or bybeing placed parallel to each other. and the number of notes of the various lengths in a measure can be readily illustrated by the means shown in Fig. 1. In Fig. 1, the same notes are represented by the colored strips as are shown in the ordinary manner at the top of the chart in Fig. 1, the strips beingof the colors corresponding to the positions of the notes in thescale and the lengths thereof corresponding tofthe duration of the various notes shown. The duration of the various notes can be graphically illustrated by means shown in Fig. 2', in which the card 17 can be drawn from left to right at a uniform speed along the strip to illustrate the duration of a whole note and similarly by means of traction length strips the duration of half and quarter notes.

It will thus be seen that the apparatus described teaches the association of a color with a tone. the position of the tone on the piano keyboard and .on a musical stafl and the duration of the various notes.

Having thusdescribed my invention, what I desire to claim and secure by United States Letters Patent is:

I claim: 7 I p 1 1. A music instruction set comprising, a chart body having thereon the representations of a keyboard and a music staff, in combination with a series of key-markers for applying to the key representations on the chart body, each key marker differing in color from each of the other key markers, sets of musical-pitch markers corresponding in colors to the key-markers and for applying to the lines and spaces of the staff on the chart, sets of devices having thereon pictorial representations corresponding in colors to the musical pitch markers for application to the chart body, and sets of combined pitch and duration markers corresponding in number and colors to the note pitch markers for application to the chart, each set of combined pitch and duration markers including a series of markers progressively and regularly increasing in size to indicate standard note durations.

2. A music instruction set, comprising a chart body having thereon the representations of a keyboard and a music stafi, in combination with a series of key-markers the chart body, each key. marker differing for applying to the key representations on in color from each'of the other key markets,

sets ofpushpins constituting musical pitchmarkers and corresponding in colors to the key-markers and for a plication to the lines and spaces of the sta on the chart, a plurality of hooks having eyes to detachably receive the shanks of push pins to hang the hooks thereon, sets of devices having thereon pictorial representations corresponding in colors to the musical pitch-markers and provided with eyes to receive respective hooks for hanging the pictorial representations on the chart, and setsof combined pitch and duration markers corres onding in colors to the musical pitch-mar ers for a plication-to the chart, each set of combined pitch and duration markers includmg a series of1markersprogres'sively and regularly increasing in size to indicate standard note durations. FANNIE E. HUGHEY. 

